JULY 2022 Ghost Towns and History of Montana Newsletter From the Whitefish Pilot, June 20, 1912 Montana’s Ghost Town Loop– Bannack & Farlin Welcome to part two of Montana’s Ghost Town Loop. This 70-mile loop tour in southwest Montana passes through scenic territory with plenty of camping options while visiting ghost towns and mining camps that helped establish the state. You will find it easy to social distance yourself from others and world events as you enjoy this loop. If you missed the last entry you can read it here. In this entry we will continue our loop visiting the towns of Bannack and Farlin. BANNACK Courtesy of https://northwestrving.com Overview of Bannack, MT Bannack, Montana was founded in 1862 when John White found placer gold in Grasshopper Creek. As news of the gold discovery spread, hoards of prospectors and businessmen rushed to the new strike hoping to make their fortune. Two years later, Bannack was desAccessed via: https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov ignated as the first Territorial Capital of Montana. However, when gold was discovered in nearby Virginia City, many left Bannack for the new strike taking the Capital with them. This was not the end of Bannack however, as some remained in Bannack exploring different mining techniques to liberate the gold from the earth.
P a g e 2 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r From the late 1860's to the 1930's, Bannack survived as a mining town with an ever-changing population. By the 1950's, recovery of gold had slowed to a dribble and the majority of folks had moved on. Fortunately, at that point in time, the State of Montana declared Bannack a State Park preserving it for future generations to enjoy. Today, over sixty buildings remain standing, the majority of which can be explored by the public. People from all over the world visit this renowned ghost town to experience Montana's mining history. Inside of the old Bannack School House Courtesy of https://northwestrving.com Courtesy of https://northwestrving.com Typical Miners Cabin Getting There: If you are driving the loop counter clockwise with your last stop being Upper Camp (see last entry): Head south of the Pioneer Mountains Scenic Byway passing through the town of Polaris until you reach Hwy 278. Turn left on the highway and travel southeast until you reach the signed turn off on your right for Bannack via Bannack Road. Camping: Bannack State Park has two campgrounds containing 33 campsites. Each campsite has a picnic table and fire-ring. Firewood is available and trash disposal is provided. The Road Agent Campground is shaded by old cottonwood trees. The Vigilante Campground is the larger of the two campgrounds and is more suitable for larger RVs. Water is available. For more info, visit here: Bannack Camping. Boondocking: Less than a mile away off Bannack Road there is a place to boondock on BLM land at N45° 09.755 W113° 00.963 Standard BLM dispersed camping rules apply. Those looking to just visit for the day: Day use parking lots will accommodate larger RVs, but may be near capacity during peak times. You might consider dropping your RV off at the Bannack turn off from Hwy 278 where Bannack Road meets the highway. There is a large gravel area located southeast of the intersection. You can then proceed the 4 miles to the ghost town in your tow vehicle or dinghy. Additional information can be found on the Bannack State Park website. Courtesy of https://northwestrving.com Hotel Meade in Bannack
P a g e 3 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r FARLIN Farlin, Montana had its origins in 1864 when rich ores were first discovered in the Birch Creek Mining District of the Pioneer Mountains. The mining claims produced silver and copper, but would not be seriously mined until years later. In 1875 the owners of the claims returned to begin developing mines on the claims, but like the nearby mines in Coolidge, the area lacked an economic form of transportation for shipping the ore to make the mines profitable. Even once the Utah and Northern Railroad laid track between what became the town of Dillon and Butte in the 1880’s, bringing more miners with them, the area still failed to become a boom town like others in the area. Eventually a smelter was built to process the ore along with the typical establishments including a general store, school, butcher shop, and post office. At its peak, the town reached a population of 500 hardy souls. By 1906 the mining operations were in financial trouble, the mines began operating only intermittently and by 1923 mining ceased. Today you can visit the ghostly remains of the school, butcher shop, a few cabins and scattered mining relics. Getting There: Farlin is located about 20 miles northwest of Dillon. Continuing your loop from Bannack, head east on Hwy 278 until you reach I-15. Head north on I-15 passing through Dillon (good spot to resupply) on I-15 to Exit #74 (Birch Creek Road). Head west on Birch Creek Road about 7 miles to reach Farlin. You will reach the first buildings of Farlin at N45° 23.565 W112° 48.824 Photo by Jolene Ewert-Hintz Photo by Jolene Ewert-Hintz Camping: There are a couple small rustic campgrounds and boondocking opportunities farther up Birch Creek Road past Farlin for those that don’t mind driving their RV down a long dusty road. The nearest developed campground to Farlin with easy RV access is Glen Campground which is a free fishing access site operated by Montana Fish and Wildlife. If you will just be passing through and looking for somewhere to drop the RV while you take your tow vehicle or dinghy to Farlin there is an open area near a stock corral with room to turn around and park your RV just east of exit 74 on Birch Creek Road at N45° 22.704 W112° 42.284 In the next installment we will head up the road to an assortment of remote mining camps and related ruins west of Melrose, Montana where social distancing is assured! By Dave Helgeson for https:// northwestrving.com/ Dave Helgeson is the MHRV Show Director. He and his wife love to travel across the west in their RV. Dave writes about all things RVing but loves to share destinations and boondocking advice.
P a g e 4 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r Fourth of July in Alder Gulch, 1865 In her reminiscence, Girl from the Gulches, Mary Ronan recalls the Fourth of July in Virginia City, 1865. The Civil War was finally over, and hostilities that pervaded even the most remote mining camps in Montana Territory had calmed and lessened. Mary remembers that it was “a day atingle with motion, color, and music.” People thronged on the board sidewalks and footpaths, and horses and wagons crowded the street, lining up to view the parade. Mary was proud to ride with thirty-six other little girls all dressed in white on a dead-ax wagon—that is, a wagon with no springs—festively decorated with evergreens and bunting. In the center of the “float,” if one could call it that, the tallest and fairest of the girls stood motionless, dressed in a Grecian tunic with a knotted cord at her waist. Her long blond hair flowing behind her, she represented Columbia, the personification of the United States. The other little girls sat arranged in groups at Columbia’s Mary Ronan at the time of her marriage, 1873. Courtesy Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, University of Montana feet representing the States of the Union. Each wore a blue scarf fashioned as a sash across her chest. A letter on each sash identified the state represented. For Mary, the memory was bittersweet. Her letter stood for Missouri, a state in which she had lived. But she wanted to represent Kentucky, the state of her birth. Some other little girl, however, had already taken the K. The other bitter pill was that Mary worried self-consciously about her appearance. She had suffered all night with her extremely long hair painfully done up in rags—one method girls back then employed to curl their hair. But the result was less than desirable. It left her hair much too bushy and kinky! -Ellen Baumler Ellen Baumler is an award-winning author and Montana historian. A master at linking history with modern-day supernatural events, Ellen's true stories have delighted audiences across the state. She lives in Helena in a century-old house with her husband, Mark, and its resident spirits. To view and purchase Ellen’s books, visit: http://ellenbaumler.blogspot.com/p/my-books.html The homesteaders west of the city will hold their annual Fourth of July picnic in Sawmill gulch on schedule time. Every one is invited to attend but well filled picnic baskets will be among the main features of the day. -The Judith Gap Journal, June 30, 1911 Courtesy of: https:// chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ FOURTH OF JULY RATES The Montana Union will make a round trip rate of $1 between Butte and Anaconda on July Fourth. Trains will run on the following schedule: Leave Anaconda 9 a.m., 2:20 p.m., 10.30 p.m. Leave Butte 8:30 a.m., 10:30 a.m., 5 o'clock p.m., 9 o'clock p.m. -The Anaconda Standard, July 1, 1895 Courtesy of: https:// chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/
P a g e 5 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r Boy Band’s 1st Pay Job At Quigley – 1896 Band of 50 Years Ago Recalled Five Missoula men of today were members of a boys’ band which embarked on its first pay job for the Fourth of July celebration at Quigley 50 years ago. Quigley, Montana 1896 Courtesy of UM and www.mtmemory.org In recalling the trip, Mr. Elder and Mr. Williams said they stopped at the “Butte hotel,” a three-story frame building, where the boys were billeted on the third floor on 20 cots. “We decided lemonade at 10 cents a glass was too expensive,” Mr. Elder said, “so we bought some lemons and sugar, got an old bucket and made our own lemonade, which Hugh Kennedy stirred with a stick.” “There were races on Main street, one horse took to the sidewalk scattering the crowd, and the night was a wild one for the miners, as considerable liquor was consumed and the jail was full – so no more arrests could be made. We took our wagon again in the morning for Bonita and the train back into Missoula.” The above article appeared in The Daily Missoulian on July 2, 1946– Courtesy of https:// oldmissoula.com/ Quigley had an interesting and very short history as Montana mining towns went. Investors there went broke quickly when the ore deposit faded out and the mines were abandoned. The town was also the scene of one of Montana’s most tragic episodes of mob action when the Chinese laundryman, Sam ‘Yank’ Hing, was murdered when he refused to leave the town. See Sam Hing’s story below: The boys of that year – 1896 – and men of today are Fred Dodge, Sid Williams, Claude Elder, W. O. Dickinson and Hugh Kennedy. Quigley, scene of the Fourth celebration of 50 years ago, is a ghost mining town a few miles up Rock creek from Bonita. The boys’ band – for $100 – made the trip from Missoula to Bonita by train and from Bonita to Quigley in a lumber wagon, drawn by four horses. Quigley, Montana, 1900 Courtesy of the Mansfield Collection at UM and www.mtmemory.org http://oldmissoula.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1567;qyankq-sam-hing-quigleychinaman-murdered-by-a-mob&catid=6;events&Itemid=3
P a g e 6 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r Grace Methodist Episcopal Church Virginia City witnessed Montana’s first Methodist services in 1864. By 1874, however, too many residents had succumbed to “depraved and wicked conditions.” Well-known itinerant ministers Revs. W. W. Van Orsdel and T. C. Iliff, then resident pastors at Virginia City, successfully held a revival to inspire the congregation. On May 4, 1875, a large and reverent crowd gathered to witness the laying of the cornerstone of the Grace Methodist Episcopal Church. Territorial Governor Benjamin Potts and Judge Henry Blake delivered addresses. Construction under D. C. Farwell proceeded rapidly. The church was, however, unfinished on August 28 when the first service was held there: the well-attended funeral of Alder Gulch discoverer William Fairweather. The finished church, dedicated on November 14, had a debt of $1,013. The guest speaker, Rev. Clark Wright of Helena, stood before the congregation, made an eloquent plea, and the debt was paid before the service ended. The building, its rubblestone walls covered in stucco, functioned as a church until 1900. A Gothic-arched entry, Gothic windows—two with original tracery—and a nameplate, which reads “M.E. Church 1875,” recall the building’s origins. In 2019, the Montana Heritage Commission received a Federal match from the Save America's Treasures grant. This money will go towards replacing the roof and windows, refurbishing the doors, installing new flooring, repairing the structure of the building and upgrading the plumbing and power. When the Methodist Church is restored, it will be utilized again for weddings and social gatherings. In May of 2019, the Montana Preservation Alliance brought a group of volunteers up to Virginia City to complete a training session where they learned how to preserve and restore the windows. The group completed half of the windows and are scheduled to come back summer 2020 to complete the rest. –Courtesy of Montana Heritage Commission Now is the time to Save Montana's History and restore some of these historic buildings. Visit https:// www.savemontanashistory.com for more information . NOTICE: This newsletter will be shifting to a DIGITAL ONLY format. Due to the rising costs of printing and mailing, we feel offering a digital version is our best option. The digital version has been and will continue to be FREE TO ALL! We want to share our stories with everyone! If you know of anyone who would enjoy this newsletter, have them contact us at ghosttownsofmontana@gmail.com and we will add them to our subscriber list. For our print subscribers: you will continue to receive the print version until your subscription runs out. No renewals will be charged or accepted from this point forward. Thank you!!
P a g e 7 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r John and Nan Marty Homestead Photo by Shawn Shawhan This is Part 2 of 3 that tells of the lives of John and Nan Marty on their homestead that is about 18 miles north of Winnett, Montana. The story comes from a book that was compiled by the women who run the public library in Winnett. The book documents all the people who had something to do with the growth and development of Petroleum County. My cowgirl friend, and photographer, has a copy of this book and I photographed the portions that were of interest to me. The photographs I’m sharing with this part of the story are ones I took on my first visit to the homestead in September 2006. My last visit to the homestead was in May 2017 and much has changed over the years. Many of the items I saw around the homestead on my first visit are now gone. No doubt those items are now in peoples’ gardens somewhere around the state. Here is Part 2 of the Marty story: “The years on the ranch meant long hours of hard work with few material benefits resulting. John and Nan raised grain, kept hogs, turkeys, chickens, and milk cows. It was not until the early 1940s when they turned to beef cattle that ranching became more profitable. Prior to that they were plagued by grasshoppers, hail, lack of rain, and low prices for grain. During the Roosevelt administration. John went out to work with the resettlement crews building dams and tearing down homesteads.” "Their only child, Joan, was born on May 28. 1931. She presently lives with her husband, Ken Smith, in Tonasket. Washington. There are four grandchildren - Jeffrey, Molly, Brent and Kelly.” “Many years were to go by before John and Nan saw their childhood homes. In 1936 the two of them, with Joan, made a trip to Photo by Shawn Shawhan Iowa to visit. The journey was begun by car but due to rain the roads became a quagmire, so from Hettinger, North Dakota, they continued by train. Joan was ecstatic with her first train ride, her first glimpse of a Negro, and indoor plumbing. In 1951 Nan spent the summer in England, and in 1964 both she and John spent several months there. On the way home, they attended the World's Fair in New York. John complained that Nan ‘walked his legs off’ in London.” “Montana blizzards have long been a legend and in the winter of 1950, John was caught in town during such a storm. For a week he stewed and fretted about Nan, alone at the ranch, and his cattle. So even though it was still storming, he hired a bulldozer and several trucks loaded with hay, and set out for the ranch. Eighteen hours later they finally arrived. John had often walked ahead of the bulldozer when they lost their way. Nan was all right, having fueled the oil stove with cupfuls of oil when the main tank went dry. After this harrowing experience, he sold most of the ranch and stock to Wayne Bratten, keeping a small amount of land and stock to manage.”
P a g e 8 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r "School for Joan presented interesting problems and equally interesting solutions. Several years, school was held in the bunkhouse which had previously housed the turkeys. For three years she boarded at the Bill Bridgers by the week when their boys started school. Since most of the original homesteaders were long gone, there were very few children to attend any school. There were never more than three enrolled, and one year Joan was alone in school, with Eulalie Winter from the Musselshell River as teacher.” Photo by Shawn Shawhan “After Nan had a stroke in January of 1967, John and Nan spent their winters in Lewistown, returning to the ranch in the summer. Thus, life flowed on until 1974, when Nan fell at the ranch while attempting to kill a snake with her cane, and fractured her hip. After three months in traction, she moved to Valle Vista Nursing Home, where John was living after a car accident. Here, in her usual ‘take it on the chin’ attitude, Nan became known as the ‘Mitten Lady’, knitting dozens of pairs of mittens for the staff's children and grandchildren.” “John sorely missed his active life on the ranch and found little to brighten his days. On February 22, 1981, he passed away. Although Nan eventually lost her hearing, sight, and ability to walk, she was never to complain. On October 10. 198?, she died at the age of 98.” Photo by Shawn Shawhan Joan added her own memories: "I feel a great sense of pride in being a part of the history of Petroleum County. By the time I was born in 1931, most of the homesteaders had left for ‘greener pastures’, so our nearest neighbors were the Bill Bridgers, five miles to the southeast. I remember riding to Winnett in our Model T Ford and having to back up some of the hills so the carburetor would remain full of gas. School was ‘God's gift to earth’, to me, and I always looked forward eagerly to attending.” “Gen Brady (Mrs. Rondall Brady) was my first grade and eighth grade teacher, and a finer teacher I've never encountered. There were never more than three of us in school in a term, a fact some of my friends can hardly believe. I went to school with Frances Sutton, Lucille Hamilton and William and Lennie Bridger. I lived with Bridgers three years to attend school which was held in their bunkhouse.” [to be continued] - Courtesy of Shawn Shawhan, Check out more of his beautiful photos at: https://abyssart.smugmug.com/? fbclid=IwAR0g5qKKbL-9fGEjGeQOfnoe7G6IIxGIYn298nyBvXDiHu36eR34AqgCzA4
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